Worth mentioning that this is the same design company that blew $35MM on a terrible redesign of Tropicana Orange Juice, which they reverted back within a couple days (but kept the mock orange cap)
Their new design was just yet another example of how the currently in vogue "minimalism everywhere" design aesthetic sucks. The Tropicana case study is such a great example because the effects were so drastic, but only really because there were easily substituted goods - consumers basically thought the carton was just "generic store brand OJ".
My guess is that other recent brand redesigns to this boring, same, sans-serif minimalist aesthetic (recent HN article, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32040506) are just as bad, but with "stickier" products (people aren't likely to leave Google or Facebook just because the typography is shittier) the downside is less noticeable.
On that subject, https://www.underconsideration.com/brandnew/ tracks the desecration of all these once colorful, beautiful, expressive logos into this new bland style that's in vogue.
Saying that this guy's designs were terrible therefore all modern design is terrible is like saying all children's TV presenters are pedophiles (apologies I know that's an extreme analogy).
The truth is that the guy behind this design agency is not a good designer at all and his career seems to have been driven by confidence, greed and the incompetence of his clients. It's a sample of one. He's the Jimmy Saville of bad design
I don’t know how management allowed them to kill the metaphor of the straw tapping an orange. It’s a good metaphor for the product's “fresh” marketing message (putting aside the “flavor packets” thing.
The one thing I think the new design had right was the lighter green for the type. That’s about it.
The straw in orange is also a fun and friendly image, without going overboard. It invites people to "solve" the visual equation. Straw + orange = fresh juice. A clever design for young and old. Amazing they replaced it with a boring glass of OJ.
Replacing the horizontal convex "Tropicana" with the straight vertical and using a more serious font, was another blunder.
They probably just got lost in many design reviews. At the end they couln't "see" the designs anymore. Also their test group was probably biased: They probably used the same guys to review all design iterations, so their opinion developed along with each iteration.
The lid really is great. But yeah that's a drastic change (new logo, new typography, new slogan, new image, new lid). They always have to throw the baby with the bath water and be radically modern with every detail.
Reddit's new design went heavy on modern/JS styling and not the raw simple HN-style text-heavy interface. They should have focused on loading the links->comments, pictures, video as quick as possible. They got the comments page to load async but video is broken and RES plugin does inline image/video loading way better. Everything else is a step back or sideways.
Tangentially Reddit seems determined to make me stop visiting it. When they finally kill old. I won't anymore. The new reddit mobile web experience is incoherent, I get that they're pushing the app but no thanks.
Not so sure about the lid: if this is indeed a true quality product leading the market, why does it need this gimmick? You'd rather expect a basic, functional statement. Together with the nondescript sans-serif type, this gives the appeal of a me-too product that would want such a gimmick in order to raise awareness.
You guessed it. Arnell Group that did the new Pepsi logo.
"The campaign, which carries the theme “Squeeze it’s a natural,” was created by Arnell in New York, part of the Omnicom Group. Arnell also created the new version of the Tropicana packaging.
“Tropicana is doing exactly what they should be doing,” Peter Arnell, chairman and chief creative officer at Arnell, said in a separate telephone interview on Friday.
“I’m incredibly surprised by the reaction,” he added, referring to the complaints about his agency’s design work, but “I’m glad Tropicana is getting this kind of attention.”
I see high level design docs like this on occasion. I decided I am not qualified to comment, but my opinion is very polar. Either it is all a very expensive pile of poop or brilliance and design beyond my understanding. When looked upon at a distance I cannot discern which opinion is correct.
As far as I can tell marketing is a very expensive pile of poop used to dress up some uncomfortable underlying truths about very real and unfortunate vulnerabilities we have as humans. It's also one of the few places where artists can reliably make money.
The result is that a lot of creative and talented people are putting out some beautiful, powerful, and entertaining works which are ultimately used to lie and to psychologically manipulate the masses in order to shape their views and extract money from them.
The vast majority of this strategy document is ridiculous drivel, written to sound profound but conveying no meaning. One early tipoff is the nonsensical timeline on page 6 -- it's basically just rattling off random bits of art history with no relation to the brand or the proposed strategy.
This Pepsi redesign is just particularly (spectacularly) bad. There are plenty of brand briefs which are intelligent, strategic and grounded in reality.
hn_throwaway_99|3 years ago
My guess is that other recent brand redesigns to this boring, same, sans-serif minimalist aesthetic (recent HN article, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32040506) are just as bad, but with "stickier" products (people aren't likely to leave Google or Facebook just because the typography is shittier) the downside is less noticeable.
ad404b8a372f2b9|3 years ago
noir_lord|3 years ago
Their packaging was absolutely genius because it instantly stood out on every shelf.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Da0flNiWkAAUda7.jpg
Other than the font it seems like everyone wants to got that way, of course if you move with the crowd you can't stand out from it.
mrcartmeneses|3 years ago
The truth is that the guy behind this design agency is not a good designer at all and his career seems to have been driven by confidence, greed and the incompetence of his clients. It's a sample of one. He's the Jimmy Saville of bad design
mc32|3 years ago
The one thing I think the new design had right was the lighter green for the type. That’s about it.
exodust|3 years ago
Replacing the horizontal convex "Tropicana" with the straight vertical and using a more serious font, was another blunder.
thisOtterBeGood|3 years ago
dmix|3 years ago
Reddit's new design went heavy on modern/JS styling and not the raw simple HN-style text-heavy interface. They should have focused on loading the links->comments, pictures, video as quick as possible. They got the comments page to load async but video is broken and RES plugin does inline image/video loading way better. Everything else is a step back or sideways.
pjbeam|3 years ago
chris_wot|3 years ago
masswerk|3 years ago
pcurve|3 years ago
You guessed it. Arnell Group that did the new Pepsi logo.
"The campaign, which carries the theme “Squeeze it’s a natural,” was created by Arnell in New York, part of the Omnicom Group. Arnell also created the new version of the Tropicana packaging.
“Tropicana is doing exactly what they should be doing,” Peter Arnell, chairman and chief creative officer at Arnell, said in a separate telephone interview on Friday.
“I’m incredibly surprised by the reaction,” he added, referring to the complaints about his agency’s design work, but “I’m glad Tropicana is getting this kind of attention.”
Full article about the botched campaign: https://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/23/business/media/23adcol.ht...
barbecue_sauce|3 years ago
bitexploder|3 years ago
autoexec|3 years ago
The result is that a lot of creative and talented people are putting out some beautiful, powerful, and entertaining works which are ultimately used to lie and to psychologically manipulate the masses in order to shape their views and extract money from them.
duskwuff|3 years ago
The vast majority of this strategy document is ridiculous drivel, written to sound profound but conveying no meaning. One early tipoff is the nonsensical timeline on page 6 -- it's basically just rattling off random bits of art history with no relation to the brand or the proposed strategy.
hammerbrostime|3 years ago
lxe|3 years ago
guerrilla|3 years ago